BILLINGS – Before the COVID-19 pandemic, way back in the 1300s there was a pestilence known as the “Black Death,” also called bubonic plague. Estimated to have killed millions during several outbreaks, the bubonic plague is caused by a bacteria known as Yersinia pestis.

Reversing course again in a 30-year-old battle over protection of a weasel-like mammal that eats porcupines, the U.S. government is declaring the Pacific fisher endangered in the southern Sierra Nevada but denying protection elsewhere in California and Oregon.

Dozens of Idaho campgrounds will be open just in time for Memorial Day weekend, officials at various Idaho national forests announced last week. But many others will remain closed — some, as usual, because of snowy mountain conditions, but some because of the coronavirus pandemic.

The Columbia River Salmon Fishery Policy Workgroup will hold a virtual public meeting later this month to continue its work reviewing the Washington Fish and Wildlife Commission’s policy on salmon management in the Columbia River basin. The workgroup, made up of three commission members, will meet May 27 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. The meeting will be conducted via webinar in response to continued concerns about the spread of COVID-19. The public will be able to view the meeting online and provide testimony, according to a WDFW news release.

Canada lynx are an elusive, lithe cat that thrives in powdery snow at high elevations. Where other carnivores – coyotes and bobcats, for instance – flounder, lynx excel with snowshoe like feet and long limbs allowing them to chase their preferred prey, snowshoe hare, through deep snow.

If you’ve never tried to plan a wedding with a man, let me recommend you choose someone else. Don’t forget to invite that man to the wedding, though. Particularly if he’s supposed to be your husband by the end of it.